Oswego grave robber arrested for failing to pay for 1995 damage

Editor's note: This story was written by staff writers John Mariani and Douglass Dowty.

Oswego, NY -- Fifteen years after he stole human remains from an Oswego crypt, Craig A. Bradley was arrested for failing to pay for the damage he caused.

Police arrested Bradley, of 39 Dutchess Lane, Apt. 4, Palermo, Thursday on a warrant that says he paid less than $1,000 toward nearly $6,500 he owed for damage to the McCrisken family crypt at St. Paul’s Roman Catholic Cemetery in Oswego.

County Judge Donald Todd was an assistant district attorney in 1995 when Bradley was arrested. He prosecuted the case and remembered the arrest came after police went to Bradley’s home for another reason.

“They saw a skull sitting on an ashtray with a pair of sunglasses on it,” Todd said. Bradley was arrested on Sept. 25, 1995, Todd said.

According to county records, Bradley pleaded guilty in November 1995 in Oswego County Court to a single felony count of body stealing. The charge stemmed from the theft of two skulls from a mausoleum in St. Paul’s Roman Catholic Cemetery in Oswego on August 8 of that year, records show.

Bradley was sentenced to one-and-a-half to three years in prison and ordered to pay $6,468 in restitution, the records show. He was released in July 1998.

Bradley was ordered to pay $25 a month restitution to include $4,760 to replace the damaged crypt door and $1,400 to repair the crypt, according to court records.

But Bradley, now 45, paid only $989.05 during the next 13 years, records show.

A warrant was issued for him in 2001 after he failed to show up for a court appearance to explain why he wasn’t paying restitution, records show.

He started making payments, but stopped after being sent to state prison on a drug charge in 2003. When he got out in 2005, the court went after him again for the money he owed.

Bradley was given two more years, until 2007, to pay the restitution. But by May 2008, he had only paid $989.05, and hadn’t made a payment since September 2002, the probation department noted in a letter to the judge.

It’s worse than that, said Mark Lazaroski, executive director and general manager of the diocese-controlled resting places. Lazaroski said the diocese received less than $200 and had to come up with money to repair the underground crypt from its own funds.

Instead of restoring the intricate bronze door Bradley destroyed, Lazaroski said a concrete door was poured and the bronze name plaque from the orginal door was reused.

The crypt dates from the 19th Century, Lazaroski said, and there were no family members left, even in 1995. He had to represent the family in court in the case he said, and he remembered Bradley, “laughed during the whole session.”

“I hope they put him away and keep him there,” Lazaroski said.

The sheriff’s department referred questions to Oswego police. Capt. Michael Beckwith, speaking for Oswego police, issued a statement saying the case file was not immediately available and that a release with details would be issued Wednesday.